Each of these systems has a separate philosophical approach to finding cures. These approaches– or systems of medicine– are summarized below alongside a comparison to the perspective of the Native American Medicinal System:

Ayurvedic Medicinal System: The Ayurvedic System purports that all humans began as domestic gardeners & cattle ranchers, that each person according to their body type (physical size of body) ought eat different types of foods, that mushrooms are “not in the mode of goodness” & should not be eaten, that animal flesh should not be consumed or worn, & that the consumption of cow milk & its product derivitives are beneficial to the human body when consumed.

Note:As opposed to the native way of eating, the Ayurvedic system advises consuming milk & denounces the consumption of fungus. Mushrooms are common throughout the wilderness, & cattle are not native to most ecosystems. Using the native system, mushrooms are favoured, & dairy of other animals is not recommended.

Chinese Medicinal System: The Chinese Medicinal System advises that people eat differently according to their blood type & is based upon a flavour wheel in which bitter is on the opposite end of the wheel as sweet & so on, & that maintaining a balance of flavours can bring one closer to health. This system also categorizes foods as either “yin” (feminine) or “yang” (masculine), & advises people to eat according to their system’s needed direction of balance.

Note: This system does not advocate “eating in the ratios that humans naturally are fed among the wild ecosystems”, yet rather purports a balancing of domestic foods & medicines. The Native American system suggests utilizing what the native traditional medicine people of the nearest wild ecosystem provides.

Collegiate Medicinal System: The Collegiate Medicinal System is built upon a nutritional system which advises to eat foods from all over the world. This “system of isolates” takes various foods from all over the planet (tomatoes from Peru, cow meat & dairy from Eurasia, chicken meat from India & Mongolia, watermelons from North America, pineapples from tropical regions, noodles from China, etc etc) & when something goes wrong (a health condition), it advises that a person takes an isolated chemical from an individual plant (see pharmacognosy) from one ecosystem & when another thing goes wrong to take another chemical from another plant from a different ecosystem, & the system tries to balance out the needs of the body based upon chemical reactions that are observed within science labs. The Collegiate System has the best recorded success with precision surgery techniques, although it can be seen as weaker when in regards to its approach regarding nutritional & chemical implementation.

Native American Medicinal System: It has been & is still a belief of many Native American people that everything a person needs to live & thrive is growing in the wild ecosystem around them. That said, this system is the only system to explore the surrounding wild ecosystem & advises to eat in the same ratios of food as the wild ecosystem naturally provides when analyzing all the food available within that ecosystem. Compared to the Collegiate System, the Native American Medicinal System seeks our intended health by evolution & design as opposed to being a game of “chemical Jenga“.

For over 10,000 years many Native American tribes lived & thrived among the botanical regions of what later would become known as the United States of America. The knowledge within this system developed during that time using the scientific method of trial & error by civilizations who lived alongside nature for a very long time while seeking to walk “in a good way” with the beings they shared those ecosystems with.

When both minor & major health problems were healed time & time again using the same technique, the tribe knew they’d found a cure.

During this era they not only traded goods– but also knowledge. In fact– we STILL DO! One of the most valuable & commonly-traded schools of knowledge are our ancient methods of herbal healing that have been passed to us from generation to generation by word of mouth, as often dictated by a medicine person. A medicine person is someone who has shown to their teacher to be able to remember accurately the cures that are passed to them, & they are held in high regard by our people. Thanks to the advent of the internet, we are now able to make this knowledge available to everyone just as it has been passed down.

WildLivingSkills.org seeks to compile the most comprehensive, accessible resource for allowing public access to the Native American Traditional Medicinal System for this database– which is set to include species that have been introduced to American ecosystems since Europeans & many others have arrived.